Daily news roundups / Featured

Valdes training with Santa Fe, Parke on call-up, SuperDraft news, history, more

Photo: Earl Gardner

Philadelphia Union

The Carlos Valdes loan deal to Santa Fe still has not been confirmed by MLS or the Union, but Valdes tells El Tiempo that he is already training with the Colombian club (crappy Google translation here).

And on Monday, Carlos Valdes tweeted,

“Thank you very much everyone for your messages and many blessings.”

At the January national team camp in Carson, Calif., Jeff Parke says maturity is an asset. “The longer you’re around the game and the more you understand it and the more you see and read the game, the better you can become. It’s trial and error. My career, it wasn’t always a steady ship. It was a bit of a roller-coaster ride for me, and the last couple years have been a lot more steady.”

It’s Jack McInerney’s turn for the ASN questionnaire.

Ten-game partial season ticket packages are now on sale.

In former Union player news, Danny Califf is now on Twitter (miss that guy) and it looks like Carlos Ruiz will be playing with Alessandro Del Piero at Sydney FC in the A-League (meh).

Local

Penn State’s Erica Walsh has been named Soccer America’s Women’s Coach of the Year.

MLS

SBI reports that New York Red Bulls will appoint Paulo Sousa as their new head coach with Claudio Reyna as his first assistant.

MLSsoccer.com ranks the top ten attacking midfielder prospects available in the SuperDraft.

SBI says the newest Generation adidas class is having a mixed performance at the Combine.

At Goal.com, Avi Creditor examines how college soccer is still relevant to the US pro game.

ProSoccerTalk looks back at how the top three picks of the 2010 SuperDraft have turned out to underscore the difficulties involved in making effective selections. I can’t help but think that Danny Mwanga should have a big fat asterisk next to his name that connects to “Peter Nowak” when discussing his development.

Chivas USA owner Jorge Vergara has confirmed that the team is looking for a new home that may or may not be in Los Angeles.

They seem to be trying to do things differently in Montreal. US Soccer Players explores.

The Vancouver Sun considers whether what might be called the  MLS style of play is emerging.

The Shin Guardian takes a stat-based look at the 2013 schedule.

NWSL

ESPNW looks at how Alex Morgan has become the face and the voice of the new league.

SI checks in with Megan Rapinoe, who recently arrived in France to play for Olympic Lyonnais. She’ll be with the French club for six months before returning to play for Seattle in the NWSL.

US

Tony Beltran is keeping a journal on the January USMNT camp in California. Very interesting read.

US Soccer “officially” released its Centennial crest on Monday, although it’s been prominently displayed on the federation’s website for at least a week, if not since the start of the new year. It’s nothing groundbreaking, simply a sash underneath the US Soccer crest which is, as this piece at SB Nation makes clear, terrible and long overdue for a replacing.

The series of history pieces on the US Soccer website continues with a look at the legendary Archie Stark, the “Babe Ruth of American soccer.” Stark set a single-season US goal record in 1925 of 67 goals in 44 regular season games in the ASL that is unlikely to ever be broken.

More history from tropigol.com, who have a piece talking to the son of Joe Maca, one of the starters on the 1950 US team that stuck it to England.

Elsewhere

Javier Tebas, vice-president of La Liga, believes match-fixing is going on in the league. “Games are being sold in La Liga and the cheaters must be exposed,” said Tebas. “Unfortunately, I cannot prove it, but games are being fixed in Spain. I cannot rule out a similar scandal to the ones in Italy.”

Sepp Blatter did an interview with Sky Sports and among the issues he discussed are concerns about having the 2022 World Cup in Qatar in the summer and the possibility of deducting points from teams in cases of racial abuse.

Blatter also said he would like to become a radio pundit when he steps down as FIFA president in 2015.

England’s FA is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year. The Guardian has a fantastic photo gallery to mark the anniversary.

 

One Comment

  1. Feel as though we will never see Valdes again in Chester…

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